Portal 2 given story, British friend, deeper gameplay

Portal 2 has the challenge of stretching its once-surprising gameplay to fill …

Can Portal 2 take the original game's premise and stretch it into something that's a little more full-featured? That's the challenge that Valve faces, and at E3 we were told that the company was surprised at the level of fan involvement the first game evoked. Players continued to interact with the world long after the game's release, listening to the song and talking about how it fit into the Half-Life mythos. That level of sustained interest seemed to demand a larger sequel.

At E3, we saw the first footage showing what happens when you go back to the testing facility and find a robot who may not be quite as destroyed as we first thought. Oh, the robot is also insane.

Many new gameplay mechanics

We saw a 15-minute video of gameplay footage showing what we have to look forward to. The new additions to the game? A robot friend named Wheatley, who seems to be a slightly friendlier version of GLaDOS. He's just as bonkers and just as twisted for spending so much time in isolation, but he's working with you to escape, and he speaks with an adorable British accent. (We were told that the audio we were hearing was simply a Valve employee performing a test voice, which is usually thrown away, but it seems as if this one would be kept through the final product. That would be a wise move, as both the writing and the voice work felt great, full of life and character.)

So what's new? Cubes that you use to redirect lasers, used as a sort of weapon. "That burns," one of the robot turrets said mournfully as we watched it being cooked by the red-hot laser. There is now a sort of gooey paint that causes you to jump higher or run faster, and you can control its flow using portals. Make sure it splashes in the right places, and you'll be able to zoom through environmental hazards or jump much higher than you normally can. There is also a sort of energy tunnel that allows you to float from place to place, and this, too, can be manipulated using Portals. Jump pads will also be used to great effect, and in some scenes you use the power of vacuums to suck up the gun turrets. Put a portal underneath the suction, put another one near enemies, and watch them be sucked away.

The story: woman vs. insane robot

The story is a simple one. You are in the testing facility, and while trying to escape with Wheatley, you accidentally wake up a very perturbed GLaDOS, who is not at all happy to see the person who tried to kill it. Soon GLaDOS is rebuilding the testing facility, and the levels seem to be constantly moving, fixing themselves or adjusting to your presence. During the video presentation we were shown how to solve a few of the more advanced puzzles using a combination of the new environmental details we listed above, and it hurts the brain to see just how devilish the designers of the game can be.

Your pal, Wheatley. He's the orb. When I asked where the name came from, I was told "from the mind of the writer," with no other details. To be fair, he sounds like a Wheatley.

The environment now feels like it's actively trying to kill you. The shifting, moving, crunching and slamming facility is being controlled by GLaDOS, and you're no longer just the subject of a test. After you have seemingly proven your power by destroying the robot once, you're now simply a target.

There is also a two-player co-op mode that's separate from the single-player story, although they both exist in the same world. In Co-op, you and the other player are robots who must work together to solve the puzzles placed in front of you, and the puzzles will be more intricate.

In short, there seems to be more than enough here to justify a longer, more-fleshed-out game. We were told that a major factor in Portal's success was the sense of surprise at the main mechanic and the feeling of exploring the power of Portals. Now that has to be trumped by fully exploring the ideas behind the Portal weapon. After seeing this short taste of the game, we're ready to play... even if we're tired of jokes about cake.